A bit of history

I went to a book store today and while waiting for the wife to finish up, I picked up a "Fishing Facts" magazine. What caught my eye was the article titled "catching slabs on the original crappie lure". I had to know what this was, where we started. The article spoke of a doctor whose last name was Estes. He was born in the early 1800's and grew to be a fisherman that was recognized by James Henshall in "The Book Of The Black Bass", a very well recognized book in the history of fishing. Dr. Estes tied a fly that, in appearance, has a resemblance to a traditional salmon fly though smaller. The body was of blue chenille wrapped with gold wire, a bit of hackle around the nose( looked palmered to me), A sparse tail of one small yellow and red hackle tips forming a V, and what is guessed as a pair of Mallard flank wings. All this was tied on a standard looking hook of average dimension with no size stated. It states that the hook was snelled to the leader and a shot(literally a buckshot with a v formed into it with an knife like tool) crimped to the snell of the hook. As best I can remember this was first documented in the mid 1850's. We haven't come very far from then to now in terms of tying, though the materials have changed greatly, namely the invention of nylon. The article was worth the price of the magazine to me, though I left it on the rack. I have 3 magazines I haven't opened yet, didn't see the sense of another. It was in the June/July issue that will soon come off the racks. I thought some of you might care to look it up, I enjoyed the piece greatly.

Skeet Thanks for that bit of history. I have been working like the last 2 years on a piece to Chronicle the history of the lead head jig. There is not much written about it's origin. Most of it is oral and early ads. Yes you are right that we have come not to far since the mid 1800's. Only like you said the material has gotten better along with the equipment. Remember these guys from the 1850's didn't have vices or bobbins. The open wire bobbins that we use to day were first made in the 1950's Thanks to Lacey Ghee and Jim Stone of Wapsi fly Independance,Iowa. Early fly vices were made in the 1940's thanks to Waltham and Elgin watch companies. Jig molds weren't possible until after WWII thanks to the aircraft industry and there use of soft aluminium.

I wonder how many of us would crank out 5 dozen jigs a day without the aid of those tools. Not only that but those early pioneers had to come up with fly pattern mostly by chance and remeber there weren't any Bass Pro shop back then to even buy material. It was the wifes sewing basket, a old ragged coat, a dogs or cats fur. or a trapping trip. They even had to maybe pluck a live chicken to harvest the needed feathers.

Yes the Good old days glad that I was born when I was and got to live during this time period.

Redman

Thanks for posting about the article Skeet, interesting.

Thanks Skeet, Very interesting to say the least!

Skip

Learn something new everyday, or at least I did. lol.

"We haven't come very far from then to now in terms of tying, though the materials have changed greatly, namely the invention of nylon." Why fix what ain't broken?

Nessesity is the mother of invention. Not broken so we have not really had to fix a thing. But we sure have had to adapt to a whole lot of new intovations and techniques. I for one don't want to give up fly vices, bobbins, flat wax nylon thread, new material, spinning reels, and graphite rods, or my marine electronic.


I am a old Geezer my first Depth Finder was a sash weight on a heavy cotton cord knotted every 1 foot. It cost me a dime for the 50 foot of cord. By the way the window never did work right again. And yes I did get a whipping for taking the weight.

Redman

Good post Skeet. Many years ago, a friend of mine gave me some old Outdoor Life Magazines from the 50's and 60's. I loved reading what hunting and fishing used to be like in its heyday. One article was about crappie fishing and the best I remembered they were used a small piece of pork rind and either a feather or spinner was attached.

What struck me was the size of the bait they were casting. It didn't look like there was any way most crappie would come near that thing. Makes you wonder what it would be like to go back in time and fish with all the gear and technology we have today.
As an old timer told me one day when fishing was slow on Kentucky Lake, son I fished this lake when it first opened up. He said you could pull up to almost any treetop and catch 50 slabs off it. I remember my stepday, who knew nothing about fishing, come home with a cooler full of slabs after a trip to Paris Landing on Kentucky Lake.

I still love hearing stories about the old days, only thing now I realize I'm the one telling a lot of those stories to my sons and in a few years my grandsons. Can't wait!

I use to crappie fish at the local Country Club where there was a pretty small lake that several golf holes crossed. This lake had mostly Cypress Trees in it and was really pretty good fishing. Caught some really large slabs out of that lake as well as some bass, ton of blue gills and even some gar for fun. It was the first time/place I ever got to fly fish. It was really nice that they let us fish there and we were the only ones doing that. Our familys were members, but still it was not a place there for fishing.
The hardest spot, but maybe the best was in the middle of one of the bridges that crossed it where several Cypress trees were right next to the bridge. Only real problem was being that high off the water and trying to pull a huge slab up to the top of that bridge, many got off at that moment and some were really large.
I was fortunate that I had a good many places to fish around Orange where I grew up, some were because my friends families owned the property or my family, like my Uncle which was the most popular Doctor in town and had the only Hospital too for a while.
I was lucky and had what I consider a great child hood with many opportunities others didn't; of course we didn't really recognize that part back then. Most of this would have been in the 1950's and yes back then I had a subscription to several of the old great outdoor magazines including Outdoor Life.

Skip

I remembered a few things from the article after I was back to work. Dr. Estes was from Illinois, but born in Ohio(I think). The jig head as we know it today was popularized in the 50's. The mold making process was improved greatly after WW2 and the use of soft aluminum was expanded. Lastly, the lure was referred to as the "Croppie Fly". A quick read but a great article for us.

I used to get fishing facts and I regret ever haveing got rid of them. Another mag which I really liked was Popular Lures (from Bass and Crappie Magazine). It was a loss when they did away with it.

I've got some Old Field and Stream and Sports Afield fishing annuals and some of the old stuff in there is excellent - they quit doing them but I got some really old ones in an ebay auction 2 years ago.

The history is out there we just have to get it. Have to search around for a copy of Fishing Facts - I'd like to read that article